Between Fear and Fascination: The Horrific in Women’s Contemporary Video Installation

In a dialogical relationship between practice-based and written research, this thesis explores contemporary video installation case-studies in relation to early feminist art practices, lesbian representation, and psychoanalytical studies. I question whether video installation engenders a more direct and visceral response to horror due to its spatial and temporal interrelation, and posit that video installations can utilise visualisations of the horrific in an attempt to redefine the rigidity of binaries that are constructed in phallocentric culture.